Heath Ledger says the bravest thing he ever did was leave his family and friends to drive across Australia in search of fame and fortune. Ledger legend has it that after finishing high school a year early, 16-year-old Heathcliff (he and his older sister, Catherine, called Kate, were named for the star-crossed lovers of Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights) persuaded a friend to join him on the 2,600-mile journey from Perth to Sydney, where he hoped to get his foot in the door of the acting world.
It's the actor's latest role -- as conflicted young soldier Harry Feversham in The Four Feathers -- that begs the question of bravery: Directed by Shekhar Kapur (Elizabeth), the story, which was first committed to film in 1921, is a chronicle of one man's inner struggle with identity, cowardice and courage amid Britain's imperialist campaign in Sudan in the 1930s.
In spite of an assured and tidy future as a military man and husband (his fetching fiancée is played by Kate Hudson), when Harry is called to battle, he becomes paralyzed by a crisis of conscience and resigns his commission, shocking his friends and family, who abandon him to his despair. But when he hears that his regiment, which includes his childhood friend Jack Durrance (American Beauty's Wes Bentley), has come under attack, Harry travels to the unforgiving desert land, befriending a Sudanese mercenary (Djimon Honsou) and disguising himself as an Arab so he can go behind enemy lines to rescue his fallen comrades.
"The political backdrop to the movie was insignificant to me,"says Ledger, whose war-torn Arab-disguised Harry may to some evoke images of American Taliban John Walker Lindh.
"It's a movie about one being true to himself and true to his instincts, defying people's opinions around him, staying true to that."
Ledger's personal leap of faith as a teenager certainly paid off -- soon at home with television roles, and later abroad, where the handsome young Aussie impressed American audiences as the Celtic gladiator of Fox's medieval series Roar, before bursting onto the big screen (and into American girls' hearts) in teen flick Ten Things I Hate About You. More complex roles followed, including A Knight's Tale, The Patriot with Mel Gibson (he won the part over American actor Ryan Phillippe) and Monster's Ball with Billy Bob Thornton (a brief but deeply affecting performance).
While The Four Feathers's four-month shoot in the Moroccan desert was at times taxing, Ledger chooses his projects carefully and relished his experience there. "It was just such a beautiful land and beautiful people and beautiful food and just a real rich kind of culture. And I just got out there and sunk my teeth into it and really enjoyed it," he says. But the opportunity to work with Shekhar was what really sold the actor.
"At first I was kind of afraid of him, thinking, Oh god, he's really going to try to get in my head. Because I'd seen all these great performances he'd pulled from people in the past, and I thought, God, he must really get in there and twist and turn. But in fact he really nurtures you, and he really cares about your performance and he really cares about the acting process. And he's just so damn thorough. You know, he handed us a brain for our characters on a plate, so we had the knowledge, so we weren't afraid. He gave us that sort of courage to feel comfortable with him, in front of the camera. He's a very inspiring man."
Apparently, after many months in the desert, the cast needed some inspiration, which actress Kate Hudson was able to provide. "She was great to work with," enthuses Ledger. "The poor thing had to come to work after we'd been working together in the desert for four months. We were all like a fit unit, we were like a family. So she must have come on and felt a little alienated at first. But she really approached it with a fresh opinion and almost re-inspired everyone and their interest in the story again."
He is less than inspired by his heartthrob status among legions of adoring young women. "I honestly don't think about it," he shrugs. "That goes on all around and out there, but it doesn't really affect my little circle of life."
His little circle of life currently features actress girlfriend Naomi Watts, whom he met while filming the upcoming The Kelly Gang, and a strongly bonded family: While his parents divorced when he was 10, they both remarried and had children with other people, step-sisters whom Ledger adores, as attested to by the new tattoo he bears on his wrist, reading: "KAOS" -- the initials of siblings Kate, Ashleigh and Olivia, and mom Sally.
Ledger can next be seen in The Sin Eater as a priest caught up in a mysterious murder and as Australian bushranger and icon Ned Kelly in The Kelly Gang. "Other than that I haven't read a script in four or five months," he admits. "I'm trying not to read one, just in case I love it. I want to try and have some time off."
